It's not my intent to bash it, but I'm curious, why this mini-series is rated so high? Can someone explain? Maybe mostly the "old" fans voted for it? Or there's more to it?
We already had pretty great sci-fis in 1983, it's hard to understand why this one gets so much praise. I've watched one and a half hour of it, but it really didn't hold my attention. Something revolutionary happens after that?
Perhaps because a lot of people find it to be a gripping, chilling, intelligent, impressive achievement. It's an allegory for fascism and totalitarianism; it wasn't originally intended to be presented as science-fiction about alien invaders, but I think it works rather brilliantly.
shareAnd that's just it.
Look at "The Final Battle" - which takes what the 1983 original set up and allows action to take over. Unfortunately, some of the intellectual depth was replaced by B-movie fodder and soap opera, and strains credibility on how Earthlings could penetrate Visitor computer systems, forge Visitor passports (with machines using Star trek sound effects, ugh), and so on. The strength of the basic plot and established characters allow TFB much freedom to trip or resort to cliches.
he 1984-5 TV show, not so much, as it was clear they ran out of creative ideas and forgot about so many nuances to the Visitors (cold skin, etc)...
The fascism and rise to power and what compels people in real life to want to join up (Daniel the outcast) or rebel (Donovan stumbling on some horrific truths and gives a damn about others' well being), etc, are well thought out, well-written, and well-acted.
Plot pacing may have been slower in 1983, but the setup was perfect for 1983 culture.
And the hidden parallels (Space Invaders game, ship interior design having a turtle or lizard feel, etc) are often subtle that many were missed. Hidden in plain sight.
As a rise to power allegory, NBC had a point - it is cliche and had happened before. But turning the fascists into alien reptiles visiting Earth, and using humans as food, hadn't really been done to any detail before - though an episode of "The Twilight Zone" did have an episode that had your generic alien looking thing treat humans as walking ingredients... "V" fleshed out the trope with so much more intricate detail, it really holds up much better than any sequel that followed it.
Sorry but one can't grade a work of art on its intention, because when it comes to art and entertainment, intention is meaningless. Results are all that matters. And the results here are cheesy and, sorry, patently absurd.
And I love classic Sci Fi.
THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD? FORBIDDEN PLANET? 2001? STAR WARS? CLOSE ENCOUNTERS? COLOSSUS: THE FORBIN PROJECT? WESTWORLD?
All great.
But V was just insulting.
Because it's one of the greatest television miniseries of all time. Good enough for ya?
shareBecause people were still high on Sci-Fi after the STAR WARS films.
http://www.freewebs.com/demonictoys/
And "V"'s budget reflects what, for the time, were impressive visuals. But the underlying plot and character development would have saved the miniseries if it had 1/10th the budget.
But it was an event. Back when events had substance.
I don't get the praise for the character development. Most of the human characters were boring as hell, while the visitors came across like campy soap opera villains.
shareI agree that played a huge part in this miniseries' success. Sci-fi spectacle of this scale on TV was mostly unheard of at the time. You'd have to go back to Battlestar Galactica, and that was nearly 5 years earlier in 1978.
By 1983, audiences were even more stoked for sci-fi at that point, after three Star Wars movies and two Star Trek films and several more space films (like The Black Hole, Starcrash, Battle Beyond the Stars). So a big-budget sci-fi miniseries on TV was going to be a surefire success. It was also inevitable that ratings were going to crash as hard as they eventually did by the time V became a weekly series, considering how cheesy and repetitive this show was.
If you're curious enough to ask the question, just watch the rest of the miniseries. It's not that long.
share*beep* Millennial Generation will never understand good writing and acting.
They're faces are always buried in the smartphones watching American Idiot contestants trying to sing on national TV and driving their gay green import cars thinking they look cool. That's what's wrong with their generation. I drive around in my gas-guzzling muscle Trans Am to show them what a real man drives.
Tell you what Zee944, this is better than InDePenis Day: Reinsertion. Watch both and compare, then report back to us with your observations.
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Trust doesn't rust.
I am Error.
*Their faces
shareRegardless of "V"'s origins, what was made has the effects polish of "Star Wars", an accessible plot for masses to be able to relate to, characters of depth, and played out seriously.
In America, circa 1983, popular sci-fi was usually known as being one of three things, or a combination thereof:
1. childish camp like "Buck Rogers", since alien planets and situations were things most adults would not suspend disbelief for (hence the shows being made for children, using other means to draw and keep audiences, no matter how intellectual or intelligent the actual stories were and "Buck" was not always blessed with deep sci-fi, and when it was it became canceled - season 2 is woefully underrated, but mainstream audiences didn't care about the creativity involved or how it was played seriously and not for laughs...)
2. effects-laden b-movies like "Star Wars"
3. cliche-driven pablum where 20-somethings played children such as "The Powers of Matthew Starr"
Yes, there was "Star Trek" - a franchise forgotten until the Star Wars movie prompted its transition to big screen with already established characters. Creating a new franchise with new characters isn't as easy. Especially when Trek's own characters were borne out of the civil rights movement, where new audiences would wonder why all Uhura did was answer phones when, back when the show first aired, her mere presence on the command center / bridge and not being white (the number one demographic, among the more racist attitudes of American culture of the time), was a message far stronger than any amount of dialogue for her to say could even begin to say. That's how great real Star Trek was. It didn't preach, it merely showed with equal merit and played it real and nothing else like it existed at the time.
"V" simply struck gold, with all the right elements and at the right time.
You would really have to be there.
Especially when only three networks and no home video existed,
Right on target Dpcole7. Thank you for putting all of that into perspective for the ignorant Power Rancher generation.
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Trust doesn't rust.
I am Error.
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I think it's not rated high enough. It's a great made for TV show, usually made for TV shows suck in my opinion but this one they hit it out of the park.
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